Good Looking UI for a stand alone application

[Peter Decker]

On 12/18/06, Luc Heinrich <luc at honk-honk.com> wrote:

> > You're full of it. I routinely write GUI apps in Dabo for both Windows
> > and Linux users, and they look just fine on both platforms.
>
> Oh, I'm sure you do. Now go try to run one of your Dabo apps on a Mac
> and see how it looks/feels... :>

I don't have a Mac, although I would certainly like one. But one of
the two authors of Dabo is a Mac user, and says that he does all his
development on a Mac, and then tests it on the other platforms. Look
at the screencasts on the Dabo site - most of them are recorded on OS
X.

> Here's a hint directly taken from the Dabo homepage: "It also suffers
> from the same display limitations on some platforms (most notably OS X),
> but these should improve as the underlying toolkits improve."

OK, it's true: you don't have 100% access to the lickable Aqua stuff
that a Cocoa app might be able to use. But paged controls use native
Aqua tabs; progress bars are native Aqua bars, buttons are native Aqua
buttons... Perfect? Of course not. But stating that it sucks is a load
of crap.

> > Using sizers is the key; layouts just 'look right' no matter what the native
> > fonts and control sizes are.
>
> No, sizers are a tiny part of a much bigger problem. Sizers might be the
> key to solve parts of the "look" problem, they don't address any of the
> "feel" problem.

Huh? Based on what I've seen on the screencasts, the apps look better
on the Mac than they do on XP. How should I judge how they "feel"?
SIzers automatically take care of font metric differences and native
control size differences.

> But you clearly have a point here, so let me rephrase: "Crossplatform
> toolkits/frameworks suck. All of them. No exception. UNLESS you only
> target the lowest common denominator, aka Windows and its Linux
> followers".
>
> Now, the OP *explicitely* said that "[his] requirement is that the
> application needs to look as good on Windows as on the Apple Mac", so
> the rephrasing does not apply in this case. So here's a last try:

Well, I don't think *anything* looks as good on Windows as it does on
a Mac, whether it is from a platform-specific toolkit such as Winforms
or a cross-platform toolkit like wxPython. If you want it to look as
good on Windows, you'll have to use VNC or something like that.

> "Crossplatform toolkits/frameworks suck. All of them. No exception.
> ESPECIALLY if one of your target is Mac OS".

Such self-important pronouncements would be better received if you
brought them down the mountain on stone tablets.
-- 

# p.d.